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Letting Children be Children
Background
1.
Nearly nine out of 10 parents surveyed for this Review agreed with the statement that 'these days children are under pressure to grow up too quickly' (TNS Omnibus survey, 2011). This confirms what many parents[1], politicians, academics and commentators have suspected for some time, that this is a widely held concern of parents that needs to be taken seriously.
2.
This pressure on children to grow up takes two different but related forms: the pressure to take part in a sexualised life before they are ready to do so; and the commercial pressure to consume the vast range of goods and services that are available to children and young people of all ages.
3.
The origins of this Review lie in the commitments made to deal with the commercialisation and sexualisation of childhood by both the Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties in their 2010 Election Manifestos, which became a commitment of the Coalition Agreement:
"…strong and stable families of all kinds are the bedrock of a strong and stable society. That is why we need to make our society more family-friendly, and to take action to protect children from excessive commercialisation and premature sexualisation... We will crack down on irresponsible advertising and marketing, especially to children. We will also take steps to tackle the commercialisation and sexualisation of childhood."
HM Government, 2010
4.
In order to fulfil this commitment, Reg Bailey was appointed by the Secretary of State for Education on 6 December 2010 to lead an independent Review. The remit for the Review (see Annex A) was deliberately wide, giving him the freedom to focus on the aspects of concern he would identify through his research and discussions with parents and others. The Government wanted the Review to assess how children in this country are being pressured to grow up too quickly, and to make recommendations on how to address public concern about this. The Review acknowledges and builds on the previous work by the assessment panel led by Professor David Buckingham on the commercialisation of childhood (DCSF/DCMS, 2009), and the reviews by Dr Linda Papadopoulos on the sexualisation of young people (Papadopoulos, 2010), and Professor Tanya Byron on child internet safety (Byron, 2008 and Byron, 2010).
5.
Commercialisation and sexualisation are issues where, to date, the media have often been leading the debate. Academics, including through the recent government reviews, have collected the evidence, investigated the complex issues and presented the range of views in a considered way. However, as the assessment led by Professor David Buckingham
- ↑ The term 'parent' includes anyone with parental responsibility or who has care for a child, including for example some grandparents.
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